PREFIRE Satellite 2: Monthly Polar Surface Emissivity Climatologies

63 spectral channels from 5 to 53 µm measure far-infrared radiation from the polar regions, a previously under-sampled part of the energy spectrum. This dataset provides monthly, 1°x1° gridded climatologies of surface emissivity, sorted by surface type and including standard deviations, derived from the PREFIRE-SAT2 CubeSat. Its primary purpose is to identify emissivity behaviors and assimilate data into climate models to improve predictions.

Use Cases

• Assimilating polar surface emissivity into global circulation models based on the gridded, time-averaged spectral data.
• Analyzing diurnal variability in emissivity using the ascending- and descending-only satellite track subsets.
• Characterizing surface emissivity behaviors by surface type using the sorted climatology data.
• Validating and improving climate model parameterizations for far-infrared radiation based on the 63-channel spectrometer measurements.

Strengths

• Provides data from 63 spectral channels, specifically targeting the under-measured far-infrared (5-53 µm) spectrum.
• Offers spatially explicit data with an 8-track cross-track dimension and 1°x1° gridded monthly climatologies.
• Cross-platform presence on NASA Earthdata and Data.gov signals its importance and official curation.

Limitations

• Metadata completeness is low: column names, row counts, and exact data size are unknown across all sources.
• The dataset's temporal coverage and specific date range are not provided in the input.
• License is ambiguously listed as 'other-license-specified' without explicit terms.

Provenance

Source

LARC_CLOUD (NASA Langley Research Center Cloud team), data collected by the PREFIRE Thermal Infrared Spectrometer (TIRS-PREFIRE) aboard the PREFIRE-SAT2 CubeSat.

Collection Method

Derived from Level 2 PREFIRE Surface Emissivity data, processed into monthly climatologies.

Time Range

Monthly climatologies; specific date range not provided.

Freshness

2026-04-09 23:04:17.782615

Geography

Polar regions, with global 1°x1° gridded data.